


Make the Best of It

by Gileonnen



Category: Coriolanus - Shakespeare
Genre: AU: Alternate Ending, Civil Unrest, Corn Riots, M/M, Ominous Dancing, Ominous Festivals, Ominous WIne, Other Generally Portentous Occurrences
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-12-04
Updated: 2012-12-04
Packaged: 2017-11-20 06:07:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 374
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/582127
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Gileonnen/pseuds/Gileonnen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Coriolanus returns to Antium bearing glad tidings: Rome and Volsci are at peace.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Make the Best of It

On the night that he first proclaims peace between Rome and Volsci, there is a feast that lasts all night and into the morning. Women dance in a frenzy, their curling hair tumbled and windblown; men pour wine down each other's throats until they nearly choke for excess. There is music like screaming, drums throbbing from the shore to the fields and feet stumbling over earth and shifting sand.

Antium is not so different from Rome. The feasts are as luxurious, when there is corn; the plebeians are as restive, when there is not.

Tullus Aufidius sits at his side, the two generals placed on thrones like king and queen together. Aufidius drinks little himself, although he plies his guest with wine as graciously as any host. The wine, he takes, fingers curled firm around the cup. He swallows it down, swift as drinking water, and grimaces at the sourness. The feast is only deserved, only _fair_ , and yet he hates being made a show. He would rather be racing the waves along the shore; he would rather be at the walls of Rome; he would rather be face-down on the earth, choking on red-wine vomit like blood.

Were he given to contemplation, Caius Martius would wonder at the queer hysteria of this banquet. The roast meat still sizzles on the spit; there were beasts ready for the slaughter even before the news had been delivered. The Volscians cried out in praise of the gods when he told them of the peace, but (if he thought at all) he might have thought they'd cry out the same at news of war renewed.

Aufidius touches his arm. "Let us retire," he suggests, eyes bright in the early-morning light, bright with reflected fires. His eyes are as clear as the ocean.

"Ay, let it be so," grumbles Martius, heaving himself from the chair like a throne, like the hangman's platform. He is unsteady on his feet, but Aufidius slings an arm about his shoulders to conduct him back to the quarters that they share.

They will grasp and tangle together until even the fires have died out, and only then will they sleep.

Tomorrow, in the red light of dawn, the commonwealth will cry for corn.


End file.
